Mr. Dole, a lobbyist with the Washington law firm Alston & Bird, coordinated with Mr. Trump’s campaign and the transition team to set up a series of meetings between Mr. Trump’s advisers and officials in Taiwan, according to disclosure documents filed last week with the Justice Department. Mr. Dole also assisted in successful efforts by Taiwan to include language favorable to it in the Republican Party platform, according to the documents.

[…] “They’re very optimistic,” Mr. Dole said of the Taiwanese in an interview on Tuesday. “They see a new president, a Republican, and they’d like to develop a closer relationship.”

[…] The disclosure documents were submitted before the call took place and made no mention of it. But Mr. Dole, 93, a former Senate majority leader from Kansas, said he had worked with transition officials to facilitate the conversation.

“It’s fair to say that we had some influence,” he said. “When you represent a client and they make requests, you’re supposed to respond.” [Source]

Taiwan paid the 93-year-old Dole and his law firm, Alston & Bird, $140,000 between May and October, according to the new disclosure. His spokeswoman declined to comment.

[…] “It does seem very strange that Trump is ignoring the State Department while apparently allowing Bob Dole, a lobbyist for Taiwan, to make arrangements for him in what appears to be a change in U.S. policy dealing with Taiwan,” said Fred Wertheimer, the founder and president of watchdog group Democracy 21. “Dole’s interests here certainly involved Taiwan’s interests more than it did American interests, and the fact that he was the intermediary raises a serious issue about just how President-elect Trump is going to make U.S. foreign policy.”

Dole’s work is part of Taiwan’s decades-long investment in grooming conservatives to bolster its U.S. relations at China’s expense, dispatching lobbyists to ply Capitol Hill, feting congressional staff with trips to Taipei, throwing parties at a vast D.C. estate, and funneling money to China hawks at right-leaning think tanks.

[…] The filing also reveals Dole’s hand in making the Republican platform the most pro-Taiwan it has ever been. The 2016 edition added language affirming the “Six Assurances” that President Ronald Reagan made to Taiwan’s security in 1982. [Source]

Like many Americans who stand for progressive ideals, few young Taiwanese see someone like Donald Trump as a decent leader. However, the anxious reaction of the American media and foreign policy establishment to the Dec. 2 phone call between Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen and President-elect Trump is also at odds with American values of human rights, freedom and democracy.

Sharing these values, we are puzzled why many commentators have treated Trump’s move as an “affront” to authoritarian China rather than consider the possibility of normalizing relations with a democratic nation of 23 million people, many of whom share deep affinities with the United States. When it comes to human rights in Tibet, freedom of speech in Hong Kong or maintaining strong relations with Japan or the Philippines, U.S. pundits rarely skirt controversy for fear of “provoking” China. Why should the rhetoric change when it comes to Taiwan — a vibrant young democracy led by a female head of state which boasts universal health care and is poised to become the first place in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage?

Taiwan’s current diplomatic isolation is a legacy of the Cold War. When the Carter administration cut official ties with Taiwan in 1979, the island was still under the rule of an exiled authoritarian regime which claimed itself as the legitimate representative of all of China. Taiwan’s uneven support from American conservatives, who saw Taiwan as a front line against communist China, is partly a result of this history. However, times have changed. Taiwan has democratized and its people are articulating new aspirations which deserve acknowledgment from Americans across the political spectrum. […] [Source]

China should “build more strategic nuclear arms and accelerate the deployment of the DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missile” to protect its interests, should Trump attempt to corner the country in an “unacceptable way”, it said.

“China’s military spending in 2017 should be augmented significantly,” it added in the editorial that appeared in both its English and Chinese editions.

In the editorial, the Global Times said: “We need to get better prepared militarily regarding the Taiwan question to ensure that those who advocate Taiwan’s independence will be punished, and take precautions in case of US provocations in the South China Sea.”

[…] On Wednesday, Trump selected Iowa Governor Terry Branstad, who has close ties to Chinese President Xi Jinping dating back to the mid-1980s, as ambassador to China – potentially welcome news for Beijing, which called him an “old friend” upon receiving reports of his nomination.

Nevertheless, the state-owned English-language China Daily newspaper remained pessimistic about the future of relations with the US. [Source]

No matter what Trump thinks, China must be determined to upset his unreasonable requests at his early time in office, and fight back if his moves harm China’s interests, regardless of the consequences to the dynamics of the Sino-US relationship. What Trump likes most is the manufacturing of conflict, amid which he wins both the limelight and benefits to his interests. If China behaves soft-heartedly for the greater good of the bilateral ties, it will only embolden Trump to be more aggressive.

No matter who is in the White House, the strategic confrontation between the U.S. and China is obviously getting worse, which is inconsistent with the interests of American society as a whole. So it is safe to say, Trump’s China-bashing tweet is just a cover for his real intent, which is to treat China as a fat lamb and cut a piece of meat off it. Trump wants to revive US economy, but he knows that the Americans have already become lazy, that his country is not as competitive as it used to be. He is trying to pillage other countries for the prosperity of the U.S.

Trump seems to be wanting to make the US a new economic empire in the 21st century under his leadership, which is about to smash the current world economic order‘s “Great Mongol Khan, whatever you want you can obtain. His thinking is too simple. He doesn’t know that the U.S. is the biggest beneficiary in the current world order, and feeling that the U.S. got too little he wants to reshape the world order into a winner-takes-all one.

China should brace itself for possible fluctuations in the Sino-U.S. relationship after Trump is sworn in next January 20. We must confront Trump’s provocations head-on, and make sure he won’t take advantage of China at the beginning of his tenure, setting the stage for China to deal with the future strategies of the new master of the White House. Only after victory in this initial battle will there be a foundation for further China-U.S. negotiations. With anti-Trump voices sounding loudly in the U.S., Chinese society must meet this conflict with much greater unity than his side. We can sustain through any difficulty, but he may not be able to. [Chinese]

]]>198139Phrase of the Week: Old Friend of the Chinese Peoplehttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/12/phrase-week-old-friend-chinese-people/
Thu, 08 Dec 2016 21:16:27 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=198135The Word of the Week comes from the Grass-Mud Horse Lexicon, a glossary of terms created by Chinese netizens and encountered in online political discussions. These are the words of China’s online “resistance discourse,” used to mock and subvert the official language around censorship and political correctness.

Mourning an old friend: photoshopped image from the time of Mao’s death. (Artist: Rebel Pepper 变态辣椒)

Official parlance for world leaders who have visited China or shown their support for the country. The “friends” most discussed by netizens include the late Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi, former Iraqi president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. The honorary descriptor was first bestowed on Canadian James G. Endicott in 1956 for his support of the revolution. Early on, “old friends of the Chinese people” were ideological supporters, but as China’s foreign policy has become more pragmatic and market-driven, the phrase has been used to describe trade partners and leaders of international organizations.

China also occasionally describes its relations with other countries in terms of friendships, referring to Pakistan as an “all-weather friend.”

Example:

Laozitanyue (@老子叹曰): Could the qualifications of Mubarak, an old friend of the Chinese people, be outdated? Befitting the high-flying international badass class? In the age of the Internet, for reasons everyone knows… the poor sap had no choice but to step down. Let this be a lesson! (October 3, 2014)

Can’t get enough of subversive Chinese netspeak? Check out our latest ebook, “Decoding the Chinese Internet: A Glossary of Political Slang.” Includes dozens of new terms and classic catchphrases, presented in a new, image-rich format. Available for pay-what-you-want (including nothing). All proceeds support CDT.

[…] Orville Schell, a revered China scholar who has been writing about the Asian country since the days of Mao Zedong, said that boded badly for human rights activists, who would be cast aside by the Trump administration as it sought to forge a new friendship with Beijing.

These sort of people will be roadkill in the way of his big leader machinations to reformat things [with China] and prove his acumen as a powerful and catalytic deal-maker,” he predicted.

[…] But political observers believe Beijing will have immediately seen the silver lining of Trump’s victory.

Shen Dingli, the head of the Centre for American Studies at Shanghai’s Fudan University, said the wheeler-dealer’s elevation to the White House meant a “more collaborative relationship” was now on the cards.

“In everything he is better than Clinton,” Shen said, before launching into a lengthy list of Trump’s perceived merits. […] [Source]

A Clinton presidency would have been “four long years of criticism – of being lectured about China’s record on human rights”. Trump’s presence in the White House will let them off the hook, Stallard concludes.

[…] Trump is particularly bad news for women in China, Asia and the rest of the planet, says Stallard: “It’s hard to suit-up and advocate for women’s rights around the world when you’re known for apparently bragging about sexually assaulting them.”

Women worldwide have reason to be fearful, according to Sophie Richardson of Human Rights Watch. She said: “It’s hard to pressure other governments to improve their human rights record when you are credibly alleged to have committed abuses. [Source]

We still don’t know what a Trump presidency will actually look like, especially as it relates to Africa. However, the president elect’s outspoken antipathy to traditional human rights principles—including his threats to prosecute his opponent Hillary Clinton after the election, his plan to build a wall between the US and Mexico, and his gleeful promises to ‘bomb the shit out of ISIS’— don’t fit the picture US public diplomacy has so far liked to present in Africa.

In this sense, the Trump presidency could herald the end of the binary pull between the US and China that we have seen in Africa over the last 15 years. The traditional narrative about the US and China’s role in Africa, presented by the US government, has been a choice between US-style development via liberal human rights and China-style authoritarianism.

[…] If president Trump follows through on some of the promises made during his campaign, Africans will find the ideal of American democracy a lot harder to share. This would further muddy the idea that in terms of both an ally and a development model, Africa has to choose between a democratic superpower and an authoritarian one. If both superpowers come to seem equally iffy on human rights, governance and civil society, then Africa’s choice of a development model will be more driven by these powers’ recent track records on economic development.

[…T]he question is whether something basic has changed in the direction of China’s evolution, and whether the United States needs to reconsider its China policy. For the more than 40 years since the historic Nixon-Mao meetings of the early 1970s, that policy has been surprisingly stable. From one administration to the next, it has been built on these same elements: ever greater engagement with China; steady encouragement of its modernization and growth; forthright disagreement where the two countries’ economic interests or political values clash; and a calculation that Cold War–style hostility would be far more damaging than the difficult, imperfect partnership the two countries have maintained.

[…] The eight presidents who have managed U.S. dealings with modern China, Nixon through Obama, have essentially drawn from the same playbook. The situation could be different for the ninth. The China of 2016 is much more controlled and repressive than the China of five years ago, or even 10. I was living there at both of those earlier times—in Shanghai in 2006 and in Beijing five years later—and have seen the change firsthand. Given the chaotic contradictions of modern China, what any one person sees can be an exception. What strikes me is the consistency of evidence showing a country that is cracking down, closing up, and lashing out in ways different from its course in the previous 30-plus years.

The next president, then, will face that great cliché, a challenge that is also an opportunity. The challenge is several years of discouraging developments out of China: internal repression, external truculence, a seeming indifference to the partnership part of the U.S.-China relationship. The opportunity is to set out the terms of a new relationship at the very moment when it is most likely to command China’s attention: at the start of a new administration. […] [Source]

]]>197723People’s Daily Lists Top “Public Opinion Guidance”http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/08/peoples-daily-lists-medias-top-public-opinion-guidance/
Wed, 31 Aug 2016 22:24:47 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=196348Representatives from government departments, state media, and industry met at the 2016 Media Convergence Development Forum in Shenzhen last week to discuss “media convergence” (媒体融合). The concept implies not just the integration of traditional and new media, but also the merger of information control with technological innovation, driven by the Chinese Communist Party. From David Bandurski at China Media Project:

The theme of the forum, hosted jointly by the official People’s Daily and Shenzhen’s municipal Party committee, is “responsibility and mission” (职责与使命), a reference to President Xi Jinping’s February 19 media speech, in which he said:

Media workers must always bear in mind their responsibility and mission in news and public opinion work, firmly upholding the correct political orientation and basic principles, raising the level of news and public opinion work, raising the communication force, guiding force, influence and credibility of the Party’s news and public opinion.

This “responsibility and mission” is the convergence of control and innovation. As Xi Jinping said in the same speech, all media are “surnamed Party,” and all must follow the Party’s line. But it is not enough to avoid committing fouls. Media must steadily seek product innovation as well, ensuring not just the dominance but the attractiveness of “the Party’s news and public opinion.” [Source]

This list comprises the 15 best examples and 15 best works/columns of convergent dissemination across all media platforms, summed up in terms of three criteria: the scope of incident dissemination, degree of convergent dissemination, and effect of public opinion guidance. They were combed through by the People’s Daily Online Sentiment Monitoring Unit over the past two years of news propaganda for major incidents and topics, starting in August 2014 with the proposal of media convergence by the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms. [Chinese]

]]>196348Minitrue: Less Misery, More Patriotism in Rio Reportinghttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/08/minitrue-less-misery-patriotism-rio-reporting/
Fri, 19 Aug 2016 06:19:17 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=196083The following censorship instructions, issued to the media by government authorities, have been leaked and distributed online. The name of the issuing body has been omitted to protect the source.

Do not report on the miseries of Olympic athletes; report more on [their] patriotic spirit. (August 17, 2016) [Chinese]

Chinese coverage of the ongoing Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro has focused more on the quirks and travails of individual athletes than on winning gold. The focus has in large part been driven by 20-year-old swimmer Fu Yuanhui, whose honesty and exuberance on CCTV has made her a star. In one interview, Fu blamed her “small arms” for her failure to medal in the 100-meter backstroke final. When the reporter told her she had in fact won bronze, Fu could not hold back her smile. A few days later, after Fu’s team placed fourth in the 4X100-meter relay, she was doubled over in front of the cameras. “It’s because my period came yesterday,” she explained, winning cheers from Chinese women on social media.

Some Chinese athletes, especially table tennis players, have chosen to play for other countries in order to have a shot at the Games. At the New York Times, Andrew Keh and Kevin Quealy reported that among at least 44 Chinese-born table tennis players in Rio, only six are on the Chinese team. The sport is so competitive in China that many athletes only find their way to the Olympics by leaving the country. Li Ping, a Chinese-born athlete playing for Qatar, told the Times that the chance to compete matters more than which country one represents.

Since directives are sometimes communicated orally to journalists and editors, who then leak them online, the wording published here may not be exact. The date given may indicate when the directive was leaked, rather than when it was issued. CDT does its utmost to verify dates and wording, but also takes precautions to protect the source. See CDT’s collection of Directives from the Ministry of Truth since 2011.

]]>196083Who Does Global Times Speak For?http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/08/global-times-speak/
Thu, 11 Aug 2016 07:03:44 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=195886Last week, a spiky Global Times editorial blasted Australia as a “paper cat” over its position on the South China Sea, bringing the perennial question of how seriously to take the nationalist state-owned tabloid back to the fore. While its provocative editorials are often reported abroad as reflective of official positions, critics accuse it of empty attention-grabbing and argue that it is best treated with skepticism, if not ignored entirely. In a profile of the newspaper and its outspoken editor Hu Xijin, Quartz’s Zheping Huang presents Hu’s own view on the matter:

China’s most belligerent tabloid, the Global Times, is certainly a one-of-a-kind publication. The Chinese- and English-language news outlet is published by the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) paramount mouthpiece, the People’s Daily, but it goes much further than China’s typically stodgy state news. The Global Times is best known for its hawkish, insulting editorials—aggressive attacks that get it noticed, and quoted, by foreign media around the world as the “voice” of Beijing, even as the party’s official statements are more circumspect.

That’s not exactly a mistake, the paper’s longtime editor says.

The Global Times often reflects what party officials are actually thinking, but can’t come out and say, editor-in-chief Hu Xijin explained during a long interview with Quartz in his drab Beijing office in the People’s Daily compound. As a former army officer and current party member, Hu said, he often hangs out with officials from the foreign ministry and the security department, and they share the same sentiments and values that his paper publishes. “They can’t speak willfully, but I can,” he said. [Source]

Many foreign news outlets assume your editorials and op-eds can be interpreted as the Communist Party’s official voice. Is that a misunderstanding?

It’s hard to give a simple answer to this question. I’m appointed by the Communist Party, so it can influence me. My tone is in line with the Communist Party. I will never turn against the party. We live in the same system. We have many similar understandings, sentiments and values.

As a market-driven news outlet, we have more freedom of reportage. We can say all kinds of stuff, while party media or official media can’t. The stuff we say is probably the same as some officials are thinking in many cases.

But it’s like this: We say these words, and the officials probably think the same, but turning them into policies is another thing. Sometimes there’s a big gap between an idea and a policy. Some ideas might never be turned into policies. Not to mention that I don’t dare to say my ideas are always the same as that of officials. There are some officials who don’t like me. For example the late ambassador Wu Jianmin, he openly criticized me. [Read more on Wu and his run-ins with Hu via CDT.]

[…] Have government officials ever ordered the Global Times to write an editorial, or write one in a certain way?

I can’t say never. But rarely.

[…] In April, an opinion poll on your website asked whether China should take over Taiwan by force “in three to five years time.” Media reports say that the Global Times was warned by the cyberspace watchdog for this?

It’s true. These kinds of things happen quite often. It’s nothing. I’m still sitting here, right? A news outlet is a practical institution, not a theoretical one. I need to make some judgements. Sometimes they might conflict with a policy, and I’ll be criticized. When they criticize us, we’ll improve our work. It’s not a big deal. It won’t kill my enthusiasm. It’s normal under the system. [Source]

The newspaper has one month to make focused corrections, standardize related management systems, further improve the process by which articles are drafted and reviewed, and conduct education for the entire editorial staff, in order to raise awareness of politics, national interests, the core, and keeping in line with the Party. All websites should take this as a warning and strengthen their respective management systems. If another problem occurs, it will be dealt with severely. [Source]

Hu’s lengthy conversation at Quartz also touched on Hu’s presence at the 1989 Tiananmen protests, and the subsequent experiences in the disintegrating U.S.S.R. and the former Yugoslavia which he says convinced him of the need for strong Party rule to maintain stability in China. Hu also discusses the relationship between the interests of Party and people; the struggle to “adhere to press freedom and the party’s leadership at the same time”; his feelings on the looming U.S. election and Sino-U.S. relations; his hopes for greater diversity of opinion and the eventual fall of the Great Firewall; and his surprising suggestion that “in general the West’s criticism of China, including the pressures put on China’s human rights [development], is constructive. In the long run, the West’s criticism will promote the development of China’s human rights. [… But w]e can never let the West set the agenda, roadmap and timetable for China’s human rights development. Otherwise, human rights will become the West’s political leverage over China.”

There are currently around twenty foreign editors working with the Global Times who are referred to as “foreign experts,” a clichéd nickname for any foreigner working with Chinese state media. They do everything from assigning stories to reporting to copy editing—as long as the coverage is not about politics.

[…] Foreigners work for Chinese state media, including the Global Times, for all kinds of reasons. Some just want to stay in China with a well paid job that isn’t being an English teacher, Mitchell said, while others are “idealists” who think they will “convert the publication to a western point of view.” And others are in it for the novelty value. “I once helped the Communist Party with the propaganda machine—it’s funnier than anything,” one former foreign editor, who asked not to be named, said. He said he didn’t feel embarrassed working with the Global Times, but some did leave because they were sick of serving the party.

[…] In 2013 after departing the tabloid, Mitchell wrote a blog post titled “It’s not a sin to work for Global Times” to counter an opinion from a Hong Kong reporter. “The opinion page continues to suck dead rats and draws the most negative attention,” he wrote, “but if one sifts through the news pages there are still some gems.”

“The main point of Global Times was just Hu’s opinion pieces and the other opinion pieces written by left-wing political commentators,” the former foreign editor, who wished not to be named said. “All of the other content on the newspaper were simply there to provide more pages.” But because of that, more provocative reporters are enabled to cover sensitive topics including gay rights, labor protests, and ethnic minority groups, he said. [Source]

]]>195886Flawed Flags and Dueling Swimmers Make Waveshttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/08/china-rio-flawed-flags-dueling-swimmers-make-waves/
Tue, 09 Aug 2016 10:35:29 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=195840
#CHN delegation asks Rio Olympic Committee]]>China’s early medals at the Rio Olympics have been overshadowed by a series of issues, including this vexillological vexation:

The somewhat subtle problem is that the smaller stars sit squarely rather than turning to face the larger one. If the graphical lapse alone were not enough, this design detail is laden with political significance: the smaller stars represent the four classes defined by Maoism, while the larger one represents the Communist Party. Their relative orientation therefore symbolizes the unity of the people under Party leadership. While the misprinted flags were probably not intended to subvert this order, the error is especially unfortunate at a time when state media and other official voices resound with accusations that foreign powers are trying to overturn Party rule. These warnings may have contributed to the finding of an unscientific online poll of the Chinese-language Global Times’ nationalist-leaning readership, that 64% believed the mix-up was an intentional slight.

“Some attentive web users have discovered that the five-star red flag used at this Olympics appear problematic,” state broadcaster China Central Television said on its official Weibo microblog. “The national flag is the symbol of a nation! No problems are permissible!”

CCTV’s comments drew more than 93,000 “likes” from Weibo users, some of whom criticized the Olympic organizers for perceived sloppiness. “This Olympics are the worst I’ve ever seen,” a user wrote.

[…] It wasn’t clear who produced the erroneous flags, though CCTV said last week that “all the national flags that will be hoisted during the [opening] ceremony are made in China,” as part of a report asserting that Chinese-made products “will be an integral part of the Olympics.”

[…] A Chinese state-run newspaper, however, quoted the Rio Olympic Committee as saying that all flags used at the games had been approved by the respective national Olympic committees. “The Chinese flag was approved by the Chinese Olympic Committee,” People’s Daily said, citing comments from the Rio committee.

[…] During Friday’s opening ceremony, Australian broadcaster Seven Network accidentally displayed the flag of Chile instead of China’s when representing the Middle Kingdom on a list of participating nations, drawing derision from Chinese viewers down under. [Source]

China’s Olympic swimming team has demanded an apology from Australian gold medallist Mack Horton after his “malicious personal attack” on rival Sun Yang.

Horton described Sun as a “drug cheat” last week and refused to retract the comments after defeating his rival in the 400m freestyle final at the Rio 2016 Games on Saturday.

“We have been noticing what has been said in the past two days by Horton, who launched a malicious personal attack [on Chinese swimmers],” Chinese swim team manager Xu Qi said on Sunday.

“We think his inappropriate words greatly hurt the feelings between Chinese and Australian swimmers. It is proof of a lack of good manners and upbringing. We strongly demand an apology from this swimmer.” [Source]

On Horton’s Instagram account, Chinese netizens demanded an apology for his “arrogance and unfounded slander.” Some called him a racist.

[…] In 2013, six swimmers on the Australian team were sanctioned for use of a sedative, Stilnox, ahead of the London 2012 Olympics. The drug had been banned by the Australian Olympic Committee some months before, and the six were warned that further breaches would see them ruled ineligible for selection for Rio, ABC news reported.

Chinese netizens’ fury is not because Horton beat Sun, but because of his arrogant comments beforehand, said experts.

He Lingnan, deputy chief of the big data and communications lab at Sun Yat-sen University in South China’s Guangdong Province, told the Global Times on Sunday that the Australian media reports typify foreign media prejudice against China.

“Recently, Chinese fans and people are becoming increasingly confident and broad-minded about the results in the different competitions,” He said, rejecting articles from Australian media that claim Chinese were furious because of Sun’s defeat. [Source]

Though an op-ed in the Global Times certainly does not represent the views of China’s people or government — the paper is known for trolling [see a recent CDT post] — the tone of the commentary echoed an explosion of angry online commentary.

[…] Despite its extensive coverage, the Global Times closed its Australia-bashing op-ed by insisting that China should not care about the likes of Horton, or rate the opinions of Australians in general.

“It’s not a big deal to us,” the piece concluded. “In many serious essays written by Westerners, Australia is mentioned as a country at the fringes of civilization. In some cases, they refer to the country’s early history as Britain’s offshore prison. This suggests that no one should be surprised at uncivilized acts emanating from the country.” [Source]

At least some voices in China counseled calm. Alongside its aggressive editorials, Global Times reported comments made on WeChat by Chinese Academy of Social Sciences research fellow Yang Zao: “Chinese people are too sensitive, and we can’t take everything to a patriotic level and ask others to apologize when individual Chinese have disputes with the outside world.”

CDT cartoonist Badiucao responded to the broader indignation by Photoshopping a scene of Horton confessing his crimes on state broadcaster CCTV. This refers to a series of televised confessions including some by those accused of undermining China’s political system on behalf of foreign powers.

The lead-up to the Beijing Olympics was a grand affair. It was as if we were showering a beloved with countless luxury gifts to win affection, which ultimately culminated in a deluxe wedding ceremony and five-star hotel reception. The energy and passion that went into the conception and execution of the games was immeasurable, which is why the Rio Olympics — marked by social unrest and inadequate preparations — felt like a personal affront to Chinese people.

There were only two ways of concealing this embarrassment. The first was to admit that China had overemphasized the importance of the Olympics — that what we had treasured was just average in everyone else’s eyes. Obviously, we couldn’t do this: we would look foolish.

The other was to moan about everyone else, making them the fools instead. Hosting the Olympics is an honor: we treated them with respect, and so should you.

[…] We are moaning about a lack of seriousness from other host countries, but the reality is that we took it too seriously. The world was left bewildered by why we felt the need to pull out all the stops and throw a huge wedding bash for what was simply a one-night stand.

We Chinese care too much about face, meaning we are overly preoccupied with holding our heads up high when facing the rest of the world. We achieved it at the Beijing Olympics, and we’ve never been able to get over it since. [Source]

Mr. Zhou, 52, was the focus of the government’s ire as the leader of a law firm that employed nearly 100 people, many of whom specialized in cases officials deemed sensitive. His firm, Fengrui, represented dissidents like the artist Ai Weiwei and victims of a contaminated baby formula scandal in 2008, which sickened tens of thousands of children and resulted in a number of deaths.

The ruling Communist Party, under President Xi Jinping, has apparently identified rights lawyers and their associates as a threat to its survival, and last year the government began a sweeping crackdown, detaining or questioning several hundred people.

[…] At Mr. Zhou’s trial on Thursday, prosecutors portrayed him as a radical who conspired with foreign governments and advocacy groups to hold protests and take on cases aimed at undermining the Communist Party.

“They were actively pulling me to their side and using me to continue attacking China’s judicial system,” Mr. Zhou was quoted as saying in a confession released by the Tianjin court. [Source]

Like the hearings of the other two rights advocates Zhai Yanmin and Hu Shigen held by the same court this week, none of Zhou’s relatives were present at the trial. Zhai and Hu’s family said they were barred from the hearings and escorted home by authorities.

[…] The night before Zhou’s trial, the Tianjin court posted a handwritten letter attributed to Zhou saying it was his own wish that his family should not attend his trial, citing their “low educational levels” as peasants.

But lawyers said the court had no legal ground to exclude family members from the courtroom, regardless of Zhou’s wishes.

[…] Two witnesses were summoned to testify against Zhou – Huang Liqun, a former colleague at his law firm, and rights activist Zhai Yanmin, who was handed a suspended three-year sentence for subversion on Tuesday.

Both Zhai and Huang were detained in the massive crackdown last July. The two witnesses alleged that Zhou used sensitive cases to instil public resentment of the Communist Party and the government. [Source]

Authorities insist the Tianjin trials are open, with the court saying that more than 40 people including politicians, legal scholars, and “civilian representatives from all walks of life”, as well as mainland and overseas media outlets, were present at Zhou’s proceedings.

But family members of those detained, particularly their wives, complain of being constantly surveilled and forcibly being kept away from the court or seeking further information.

[…] AFP was not given access to the court Thursday, and in previous cases only court-appointed defence lawyers have been present. [Source]

AFP correspondent Beck Davis tweets on the close scrutiny she received in Tianjin:

WOW. Now that's what I call a subtle approach. "Inconspicuous" cop earning his gold star at Zhou Shifeng trial: pic.twitter.com/8uLSiuh7iI

Zhou pleaded guilty to subversion of state power and would not appeal the sentence issued by a court in the northern city of Tianjin, the official Xinhua news agency said.

“Zhou Shifeng had long been influenced by anti-China forces” and had hyped cases and made remarks online and offline about “overturning the government”, Xinhua citied prosecutors as saying.

[…] Xinhua said Zhou had confessed that the firm’s actions had drawn the attention of “foreign forces”.

“They actively enticed me, wanted to use us to continue to attack court trials, attack China’s entire trial and judicial system, and bring trouble to the government. Their ultimate goal is to overthrow the Communist Party leadership,” Zhou said in a prosecutor’s statement, according the Xinhua. [Source]

Just take a look. On August 2, the trials of Zhai Yanmin and others began in Tianjin. On August 1, this mob of foreigners came outside the Tianjin Second Intermediate People’s Court where they met up with the families of the defendants on the street opposite the courthouse. First, they got together for a friendly and familiar little chat. And it seems to me, looking at the scene, that they’ve all known each other for quite some time. And then, the foreigners asked those two women into their vehicle and made their way to the courthouse.

Maybe you’re all wondering: Just who are these foreigners? And you’d be hitting the nail on the head with that question. Let’s just take a look at their vehicles. Look right here. [Camera points to the diplomatic plate of one of the cars, showing the first two digits and blurring the rest: 22xxxx is either a US or UK Embassy vehicle.]

Chatting and laughing together, this crowd arrived at the court entrance. Then, upon seeing foreign journalists, the first woman [Liu Ermin, wife of Zhai Yanmin] suddenly pulled a sad face and expertly fell down, sat on her butt, and made a scene yelling and crying. [She was roughed up by a plainclothes police officer, who pushed her to the ground, according eyewitness accounts.]

The second woman [Wang Quanzhang’s wife Li Wenzu] somehow pulled out a sheet of paper and began shouting too. Our “foreign friends” then, like they were well-trained, made a circle around them, as though they were making a little busking stage for the heroines to display their talents. Truly, these were well-trained performers. [The diplomats encircled the two wives to stop plainclothes police dragging them away.] […] [Source]

No official reason was given for the Indian government’s decision, but sources said the three had come under the “adverse attention of security agencies” for allegedly indulging in activities beyond their journalistic brief.

The sources, however, said the action did not imply that Xinhua journalists are not welcome in India. “The agency can replace them with others. There is nothing here to construe that Xinhua has to wind up its news operations in India,” a source said.

[…] Commenting on the expulsion, Mohan Guruswamy, chairman of the Centre for Policy Alternatives, said that not extending visas of journalists is a needless aggravation.

[…] Ranjit Kalha, a former secretary in the MEA [Ministry of External Affairs] said that the move seems to have been “done without thinking through [the] outcome,” reported Thewire.in. [Source]

The three were suspected of impersonating other people and visiting unauthorized areas with assumed names, according to intelligence reports.

[…] Lü Pengfei, a former People’s Daily reporter in India, told the Global Times he had visited Dhramsala with two of his colleagues in 2014 using their true identities. “Besides, Bangalore is not a restricted area.”

“I have frequently met exiled Tibetan activists through intermediaries, and even spoke to the Dalai Lama. I should have been expelled several times if that was the reason the Indian government gave. It was very likely an act of revenge against China for denying India membership in the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG),” Lü said [Read more on the NSG row from the BBC.]

[…] The incident could indicate an increasing mistrust between the two countries. India thinks China does not pay it enough respect as a regional or global power, Zhang Jiadong, a professor with the Center for American Studies at Fudan University, told the Global Times. [Source]

The New China News Agency, better known by its Chinese name “Xinhua,” and other major media outlets file internal reports to the Central Committee or their respective policy systems on topics deemed too sensitive for publication. For those reporters posted abroad, these reports can deal with internal security targets (like Tibetans, Uighurs, Taiwanese, Falungong, and others) or more traditional intelligence targets. The original Xinhua charter explicitly noted this information gathering role. Although most Chinese journalists are not intelligence officers and do not recruit clandestine sources, good journalists can provide information that is not publicly-available, but also not classified. [Source]

The Associated Press’ Gerry Shih and recently deported NGO chief Peter Dahlin commented on Twitter on this aspect of the agency’s operations following the news from India:

Since her release, the only people who are believed to have seen Zhao are her mother and father, because Zhao posted a message about celebrating her mother’s birthday with them.

Neither Zhao nor her parents were reachable.

[…] In one post on her Weibo page, she thanked police for treating her well. In another, she accused her former employer, Li Heping, of having “concealed information from her” and that she was “so naive” to trust and work for him.

[…] Those who knew Zhao have expressed surprise at her attacks given her strong advocacy of rights causes. She also accused her lawyer, Ren Quanniu, of spreading rumors of purported sexual abuse she suffered while in detention.

[…] Police arrested her lawyer, Ren, in Zhengzhou on Friday, in Henan province, and charged him with “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”. [Source]

First was a short post, published in the early afternoon, that expressed pleasure at being outdoors and thanked the police, “who helped me immeasurably as if they were relatives.” Several hours later, a longer open letter appeared on her account. It described how she came to work for Mr. Li [Heping] out of a desire to improve society and her later discovery that he was being supported by an unnamed foreign nonprofit group. The group said its aim was to do anti-torture research, she wrote:

In reality it was sponsoring projects as a way to collect information on sensitive domestic incidents that it could hype up to attack China’s legal and social systems, agitate for change and bring about China’s peaceful transition. The so-called “seminars” they organized were only intended to provide a platform for ‘human rights lawyers’ and sensitive people, turning such people into allies and pawns in their efforts to penetrate China and realize peaceful evolution.

[…] China’s state media have ramped up reports that portray foreign nonprofits as a threat to social and political stability, backing an effort under President Xi Jinping to severely restrict the ability of such groups to work in the country. On Thursday night, the nationalist tabloid Global Times jumped on the news about Ms. Zhao, running a story about her under the headline: “Post-90s Beauty ‘Koala’ Exposes the Dark Secrets of ‘Human Rights Lawyers’: I Was So Simple!”

Ms. Zhao couldn’t be contacted. Her lawyer, Ren Quanniu, said neither he nor Ms. Zhao’s husband had been able to contact her since police announced her release. Mr. Ren said Ms. Zhao is likely still under police control and that the point of her release was to smear Mr. Li and the other lawyers. [Source]

You also questioned whether Zhao had written an online apology in which she blamed “naivety” for her decision to become involved with lawyers who she claimed she had discovered were attempting to destabilise the Communist party.

“To be clear: the government is controlling her. I don’t think [those posts] were written of her own freewill,” You said. [Source]

Phillips goes on to note that supporters of Li Heping fear that Zhao’s “confession” and Weibo posts may hint that authorities are planning to give him a heavy sentence. Both Zhao and Li were charged in January with “subversion of state power,” an exceptionally serious crime that could result in life in prison. Even if truly released on bail, Zhao could still face the subversion charges at trial.

[Updated at 23:29 PDT on Jul 11, 2016:Zhao has claimed authorship of the posts in a phone interview with South China Morning Post, insisting that she “truly wanted to repent,” and saying that she is now staying with her parents in Henan. The newspaper noted, however, that it “could not verify Zhao’s location or whether she was under surveillance during the interview. Zhao declined requests for a face-to-face interview.” Her husband remains suspicious, and is planning to travel to Henan to meet her.]

“We call on you as the president of the People’s Republic of China to dedicate your personal attention to ensure that the country honours its commitments to the constitution, national law [and] the UN Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers,” said the letter, which was signed by more than a dozen overseas bar associations and lawyers’ groups.

It also asked authorities to stop interfering with the families of the detainees as they sought legal assistance and to ensure adequate medical treatment for their loved ones and visitation rights.

[…] Separately, the International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute issued an open letter calling for “the immediate and unconditional release” of all lawyers detained since last July.

“Such attacks violate the fundamental rights of both lawyers and their clients, risk causing irreparable damage to the independence of the Chinese legal profession and undermine the rule of law,” it said in a statement. [Source]

“US police repeatedly kill black people in the streets, and black people killed five police officers in the Dallas protests, in addition to wounding several police officers – there are obviously problems with human rights and justice in the US. And the US still has the mood and energy to disrupt law and order in China – the west is so self-satisfied, it makes one marvel,” said the editorial.

“The Department of State remains deeply concerned about the continued detention in China of at least 23 defence lawyers and rights defenders and denial of access to independent legal counsel,” said the US Department of State in a press release on Saturday, the anniversary of the crackdown.

The German embassy in China also issued a statement on the crackdown, saying “the situation of the persons affected by the crackdown remains an issue of grave concern.”

[…] The Global Times editorial questions why western discourse is so concerned with the arrest of only 23 people out of the tens of thousands of lawyers in China and says the west is picking and choosing which cases to focus on based on its own political agenda. The Fengrui law firm, one of the focuses of the crackdown, falls within the circle of “democratic forces” supported by the west, it said. [Source]

]]>195169Minitrue: Don’t Hype, Speculate, or Comment on Brexithttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/06/minitrue-dont-hype-speculate-comment-brexit/
Wed, 29 Jun 2016 19:18:13 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=194944The following censorship instructions, issued to the media by government authorities, have been leaked and distributed online. The name of the issuing body has been omitted to protect the source.

Regarding the British vote to leave the European Union and related matters, immediately control the scale of coverage on all websites and new media platforms: reduce the quantity of reports, and don’t hype the story, speculate, or comment. (June 27, 2016) [Chinese]

One thing that seems obvious is that it is a propaganda windfall for Beijing as the screed against the perils of mass democracy basically writes itself. Greece nearly collapsed a few years ago, Britain looks to be driving itself towards a cliff, and if America elects Trump president then three of the cradles of democracy will have highlighted to those with an illiberal bent the dangers of unchecked democracy, effectively giving the Chinese Communist Party a propaganda trifecta. [Source]

On Saturday—prior to the directive, though different rules often apply to top state media in any case—People’s Daily pursued this theme with zeal. It highlighted the economic and political instability following the vote, the divisiveness and distortions of the campaign, the likelihood that the referendum will fail to address people’s basic anxieties, and the sizable minority pulled along against their will:

On June 24th, the results of the U.K.’s “Brexit” referendum appeared. With the “Leave” faction winning a majority, Britain’s separation from the European Union will become a reality. This is a major decision by the British people regarding the course of their national development, and the rest of the world should respect it. But it is worth noting that the voting result offers no readily available solution to a number of real issues that Brexit brings, or to the various problems arising from the referendum itself.

As soon as the “Leave” result was announced, global markets sank into panic. At the same time, news kept spreading of Scotland and Northern Ireland demanding independence, and of right-wing factions in other member states demanding to vote on leaving the E.U. as the U.K. had. Right now, the most important thing for Britain and the E.U. is obviously to try to conduct effective “crisis management” following the referendum, to prevent its negative effects from spreading out of control. At the same time, they must quickly reach an agreement through relevant negotiation to stabilize people’s expectations for the continent’s future.

Stirring up disharmony would be a source of instability in any society. To increase their own influence, the Leave and Remain camps each attacked the other without restraint, not even hesitating to abuse fact and statistics. Before the vote, “Harry Potter” author J.K. Rowling wrote on her blog that “the tales we have been told during this referendum have been uglier than any I can remember in my lifetime,” even for someone who has “created monsters” in stories herself. Guardian columnist Zoe Williams was even more direct: “No general election has ever been as full of mendacity as this referendum, so that the casual voter basically has to guess who is telling the truth by how fast they’re talking and the look in their eyes.” [The Chinese translation, reflected here, differs slightly from the original.]

The Brexit trend had various earlier manifestations in Britain. That it has now come to fruition is inseparably linked to the culmination of a widespread sense of anxiety in British society in the wake of the international financial crisis. Income growth stagnated, employment stability dropped, social justice was lacking … a number of such problems intensified the British public’s hunger for change. But the problem is, a single referendum cannot solve these problems. More importantly, with economic globalization already an established historical trend, can people really turn back the clock?

Obviously, the referendum outcome doesn’t show that British society has reached consensus, because no small number of Britons supported Remain. The U.K.’s domestic differences are as prominent as ever. A considerable section of the population is completely unconvinced that Brexit will naturally increase economic competitiveness, bringing better development opportunities and more wealth; they even anticipate that the shock of it will bring irretrievable costs. [Chinese]

The UK voted to leave the EU, with the Leave supporters beating Remain by 51.9 percent to 48.1 percent. The slight victory is likely to have opened a Pandora’s box in Europe, pushing the continent into chaos.

[…] Europe is not able to resolve the problems it is facing. The public are confused and disappointed and extremism is steading.

The Leave grouping beat out the Remain supporters by only 4 percentage points, which could have resulted from some temporary reasons. Is it really fair to decide Britain’s future this way?

[…] There is no direct political impact on Russia and China. For the Chinese people, who are at a critical time to learn about globalization and democracy, they will continue to watch the consequence of Britain’s embracing of a “democratic” referendum. [Source]

The “Brexit” decision “will cast a shadow over the global economy … The repercussions and fallout will emerge in the next five to 10 years,” said Lou Jiwei, China’s minister of finance, at the first annual meeting of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank in Beijing.

“It’s difficult to predict now,” he said. “The knee-jerk reaction from the market is probably a bit excessive and needs to calm down and take an objective view.”

[…] Huang Yiping, a professor at Peking University and a member of the central bank’s monetary policy committee, said it is hard to judge the direct impact of the British referendum on China’s economy.

“If (Brexit) is an important landmark in terms of a reversal of globalisation, I think that’s very bad for the world, it’s very bad for China,” Huang said.

Li Daokui, a professor at Tsinghua University and a former adviser to China’s central bank, was more optimistic on the referendum’s effects on the world’s second-largest economy.

“China is perhaps one of the least impacted economies in the world by the event of Brexit,” he told an audience at WEF.

“The only short-term impact I can think about is the exchange rate of the renminbi … But I do think within a few trading sessions that situation will very quickly be subdued,” Li said. [Source]

At least one major target of “Leave” campaigners in the U.K. – an unaccountable bureaucracy in Brussels, enjoying the fruits of power – will certainly resonate with Chinese citizens. Despite a recent corruption crackdown, dissatisfaction with officials is simmering in many parts of China – over land grabs, unpaid wages, layoffs and more. For the Communist Party, a popular rejection of distant bureaucrats isn’t to be taken lightly.

[…] A deeper worry for the party is instability. The political and business classes in China are extremely risk-averse. Banks lend to state-owned enterprises in the belief that the government stands behind them, students from the best schools aspire to the civil service, and changes to policy flow from on high. Party technocrats tend to see political and financial instability as intimately linked. And as Premier Li Keqiang stressed repeatedly yesterday at the World Economic Forum, Brexit has increased both.

[… E]xpect China’s leadership to double down on economic and financial policies intended to keep growth humming and minimize any disruption, no matter what the price. That may mean a further weakening of the yuan and more credit-fueled investment. It may mean leaders will think twice about undertaking contentious bank reforms. And a much-needed overhaul of state-owned enterprises – which risks turning laid-off workers into crowds of protesters – could be placed on the backburner. A further tightening of dissent also can’t be ruled out. [Source]

“One major reason why China attaches great importance to its relations with the U.K. is to leverage EU policy via the U.K.,” said Xie Tao, a professor of political science at Beijing Foreign Studies University. London’s value as a “bridgehead” to Europe has been lost with Brexit, Xie said, leaving China to turn its focus to Germany.

[…] “Brexit might end up as a blessing in disguise for China,” said Ruan Zongze, vice president of China Institute of International Studies, a policy research group run by China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “It looks like a bad situation on the surface, but there are opportunities that can be discovered and played up, as long as there’s effort on both sides.”

[…] “If a more conservative leader takes over, the successor may ditch the U.K.’s current China strategy and move back toward its ‘special relationship’ with the U.S.,” said Zhang Baohui, director of the Center for Asian Pacific Studies at Lingnan University in Hong Kong. “A weakened EU, which may see more defections after the British vote, is not in China’s grand strategic interests.”

[…] “On the whole, China would have preferred for their own self interest for the U.K. to stay in the EU,” said Kerry Brown, director of the Lau China Institute at King’s College, London, and a former U.K. diplomat in Beijing. ”In the end, I think that China will work to its advantage with whatever outcome eventually emerges.” [Source]

Finally, from a larger geostrategic perspective, it would seem that China is the big winner from Brexit. Europe is likely to be a less influential player on the world stage and will be absorbed with internal issues of negotiating the British exit, controlling immigration, and keeping the periphery inside the eurozone. The United States is also likely to be distracted by these European challenges. This gives China more scope to pursue its reclamation activities in the South China Sea and to play divide and conquer with European states on various issues. For example, China would like to be recognized as a market economy, which is both symbolic and a practical matter for adjudicating anti-dumping cases. It is also negotiating investment treaties with both the United States and the EU, though so far China’s offers have not been very attractive in the sense that they exempt many important sectors from open investment. A U.K. no longer in the European Union will presumably be anxious to strengthen its ties with China so it may well be willing to make compromises on market-economy status and investment deals that a unified Europe would not have made. Brexit itself may not be that important but it may prove to be a good signal of the decline of Europe and the rise of China. [Source]

[T]he referendum is a game changer. Brexit threatens what lies at the core of the UK-China relationship: Britain’s promise to serve as an ‘essential partner for an opening China, for the benefit of [both] peoples.’ The question ahead for British policymakers — and, importantly the captain that steers the ‘leave’ ship after Prime Minister David Cameron — is whether the United Kingdom can still be the western country ‘most open’ to China’s rise. It is a question that has serious reverberations for China’s economic standing at a time when its economy is slowing and it continues to search for global partners.

Assuming the two-year process to leave the EU proceeds without hiccup or member state opposition, once the UK is fully divorced from the EU, China will lose its access to the European market via Britain. The United Kingdom is no longer an attractive extension of the ‘one belt, one road’ initiative to link markets from Europe to China by land and sea. For existing plans to develop the ‘northern powerhouse,’ boosting economies in Manchester, Leeds, and Liverpool, Britain cannot expect the deep pockets of Chinese investors to save the day. Additionally, with London as host to more than 40 percent of the global market for currency trading — and the second largest offshore centre of renminbi — it will be difficult for the City to retain its lustre and gateway banking position in Europe. While offshore yuan trading centres are largely dictums of Chinese policy, the Brexit will, at a minimum, yield a significant re-think of Beijing’s fiscal posture in the UK. [Source]

Chinese companies have invested heavily in the UK in recent years, and the stock of Chinese overseas direct investment in the UK stood at around US$13bn at end–2014, the second-largest in the EU, according to the latest data from China’s Ministry of Commerce. The many Chinese firms that have invested in the UK property market will probably have to book a loss in the near term as these assets fall in value, and this could give rise to domestic criticism about the wisdom of such investment choices. Some new investors might view falling property prices and a weaker pound as boosting the attractiveness of UK property assets, but we generally assume that they will want to wait until the political scene stabilises and economic prospects become clearer before entering the market—a process that could take years.

Amid heightened risk aversion, Chinese investors are likely to become more nervous about future planned investments in the UK, including in strategic projects under discussion, such as the Hinkley Point nuclear power plant and high-speed railway, as well as in financial services. The UK’s appeal to Chinese banks has rested in its access to the EU market, but the UK will struggle to retain similar access in services trade following Brexit. This could prompt China to look to other European financial centres, besides the UK capital, London, in its effort to internationalise the renminbi and create major offshore trading hubs.

[…] The political implications of Brexit will also be significant for China. Since 2012 the UK has been a supportive voice within the EU for closer ties with China and has historically been one of the strongest advocates of free trade. It was the first EU country that said that it would join the China-led Asian Investment Infrastructure Bank, has expressed support for China to be granted Market Economy Status later this year and would be favourably disposed to an EU-China bilateral investment treaty. Losing such a voice within the EU could complicate China’s relationship with the trading bloc, with German influence likely to increase. Human rights issues have held a more prominent place in Germany’s foreign policy than in that of the UK in recent years.

Besides, the political recriminations in the EU that will follow Brexit suggest bilateral discussions with China over such issues would be put onto the back-burner for a number of years. Arguably, China could view such a crisis as an opportunity for it to maximise influence and play off EU members against each other. However, the Chinese government generally views instability unfavourably, and would probably see any broader fallout in Europe—such as steps towards breaking up the EU—as highly undesirable. [Source]

Since directives are sometimes communicated orally to journalists and editors, who then leak them online, the wording published here may not be exact. The date given may indicate when the directive was leaked, rather than when it was issued. CDT does its utmost to verify dates and wording, but also takes precautions to protect the source. See CDT’s collection of Directives from the Ministry of Truth since 2011.

“The newest fashions. State-of-the-art electronics,” the video begins, sounding like a commercial. “Don’t you want to get your hands on these as quickly as possible?” Viewers are advised that if they do, “then you better pray for smooth sailing in the South China Sea!”

The future of smooth sailing in the South China Sea is currently murky. An international tribunal in the Hague will soon rule on the validity of some of China’s claims in the South China Sea after the Philippines, one of several countries in the region whose territorial claims there overlap with China’s, filed the case in 2013. China has repeatedly declared it will not adhere to any decision made by the tribunal. To help reduce the toll to its international image if it flouts a ruling by an internationally recognized legal body, China has launched a major public relations campaign attempting to win foreign nations over to its side. The latest video shows Beijing hasn’t forgotten the importance of rallying domestic support.

[…] While the video is upbeat in tone, the United States comes in for some criticism. While English translation of the Chinese video softens its rhetorical edges a bit, the original Chinese says that given the U.S. position “very, very far away” from the South China Sea, the United States has been “too actively engaged” in the region, including its backing of the Philippines arbitration case and U.S. deployment of spy planes near China’s border. The video calls such actions “bellicose.” [Source]

While Foreign Policy’s coverage ends by reporting on a largely favorable netizen reaction to the video, many less approving comments were posted to Weibo—and quickly deleted. CDT Chinese has compiled some examples from Free Weibo, and a few are translated here:

“Although the book was important, I threw it away because it was broken,” he says.

“It was flipped through too many times. The salty seawater on the hands had corroded it… In the end it was no longer readable so I threw it away.”

Whatever it was, Mr Su’s book is not, it seems, any longer ironclad proof of anything. Except perhaps China’s Communist Party-controlled media’s willingness not to let a few facts get in the way of the official narrative.

We leave Mr Su’s house, a little baffled by the experience, and are given another glimpse of Hainan’s readiness to control the message when it comes to the South China Sea. [Source]

“In a bid to force those polluting enterprises, we say no to them in the production course, which means we would no longer purchase your products,” Ren was quoted as saying.

[…] “Products supplied should meet the green standard in the first place. Secondly, the production process of the products should be ecologically friendly.”

[…] As the son of a former vice-minister of commerce, Ren was regarded as a “princeling”. He also reportedly had close relations with Wang Qishan, the chief of the party’s corruption watchdog. They knew each others when they were teenagers.

Ren was accused of serious violations of party discipline and was reprimanded by the party committee of Dongcheng District in Beijing in early May. [Source]

Zeng’s entire extended family has been under great pressure from the authorities since Chen presented the case against Xinhua, according to a family member who wish to remain anonymous. Last Sunday, Chen’s ID was taken by the police, who told her they were confiscating it to provide a “helpful service” and drop the case on her behalf.

Zeng’s wife, a school teacher, has been not only been visited regularly by police, but her job has been threatened by the management at the school where she works, which demanded she keep a low profile since Zeng’s detention if she wanted to remain employed.

Cousins and nephews of Zeng have received phone calls from blocked numbers telling them that “those who are inside cannot come out, and those outside will bear the consequences for generations to come,” one family member said, an apparent reference to Zeng, who is being detained “inside,” and his family on the “outside.”

[…] Chen’s lawyer Chang Weiping said in a telephone interview it was news to him that the family was dropping the case. “I cannot immediately confirm if they’ve finally succumbed and dropped out,” he said May 2. “I haven’t been informed, (but) she can drop the case without my intervention,” Chang added. [Source]